Awesome, Christlike behavior. Thanks for helping him and being a good example.
It sounds like he was trying to do his best; and you helped him–the best kind.
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I guess. But it’s also a bit annoying that somehow
I’ve become the person on the street people show up at. Because I typically get off work at 130pm, everyone who sees me at my house feels like it’s the midday. They wake up at 8-9am. They go sleep at midnight. To them me helping them seems like I’m off. But the reality is that I get up at 130/2am. I go to sleep at 639-830.
I feel obligated that if they don’t know what to do and I don’t try to help at least get them going, if something goes wrong I would feel bad. Like if he just had the jack in the dirt, I emergency brake on and the wheels not blocked and it slid with the tire off and really hurt him or worse I would feel a bit accountable despite it not actually being my responsibility. Plus while there, a few of the tools being used was definitely some of mine stolen previously.
It’s also winter. I don’t take pain pills at all but was hit by a car years ago and it broke my back. Had to get spinal fusion and something on the ball of my hip. 2 years after that, right before I got out of the army got jumped in Texas and stabbed a few times my stomach and arm. So every winter just hurts and end up being ina almost bad mood the whole time. Hate the cold and hate short days. If I could hibernate all winter I would lol. I feel so claustrophobic in the winter. I like to leave my window curtains all open. In summer it’s sunny and bright the whole time. Can see all the trees. In summer when I go to bed the sun is sometimes still up or just setting. But in winter , even with the curtains open it gets dark at like 5pm. Just dark and cold and miserable. Because my roof is really flat and 60x40, I often bring my sleeping bag up on the roof and use an extension cord to charge my phone and a heated blanket and so even though it’s 50°f outside I sleep warm. Really relaxing just seeing wispy clouds and stars all night. About to head up there now actually.
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This is why I teach – well, that and I love to teach. Some people get pissed that I won’t just fix things for them, but if they won’t accept being taught I tell them it must not be worth much to them. Something kool is that I’ve encountered guys in their 80s who are happy to learn something new.
Got dark at 4:38 here today.
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This is one point where the perspective and attitude matters. I live in a relatively southern area with relatively much light - sunset today at 3:39, darkness at 4:36 pm. It is a long day (6h between sunrise and sunset) compared to what those living up north have - no sunrise or sunset during mid winter. In the northernmost Finland, they still have to wait for more than a week to see the first rays of sunrise, assuming the sky is clear and you climb on a fjeld (treeless hill or mountain).
Good reason to enjoy and be thankful for the sunshine we see during mid winter.
Especially as the blind do not see the sun ever.
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That is a good perspective. Thanks. When we lived closer to the equator in Africa, sunrise and sunset times not only stayed quite constant, at about 7 o’clock, but the duration was much shorter…once it started getting light or dark, it was either day or night very quickly. We carried flashlights to watch for snakes in the afternoon, in case we got caught out longer than expected.
In contrast, when my sister and I went camping in Alaska 20 years ago, we did not expect to have such a short night in July. With a light tent, it was dark from about 1130 or midnight till 4, and it was a relief at the end of the week to rent a hotel room, close all the dark curtains, and sleep as long as we wanted to! That was a fun trip.
Thank you for your perspective. I have a lot to be grateful for. I did like Africa, but it was so hot that though the rainfall was not much less than here, it was much drier, and the people suffered much from frequent drought and famine.
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Hey! I recognize that blue trail marker! I’ve seen that much farther north.
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Blue, red, orange, yellow and green are often used as trail markers. Sometimes you’ll see 2+ colors because the trails merge at some points. That way
You know what loop you are on. Like the blue may be 3 miles and the yellow 4 or the blue may be used because it cuts through wetlands and the yellow is used to cut through the pine savanna type stuff. They especially come in handy when in a 15+ mile long trail that weaves in and out of numerous other ones.
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Yes. You are right.
But this blue marker is a single trail he and I both know from different parts of Michigan. It actually goes through 8 states.
Last summer my husband were walking at the Cheboyagan State Park and got on the Green Trail, which was hilariously carefully marked with posts. The beach “trail” with Lake Huron to the north and east, the forest to the south and west, seemed to to us to have pretty clear markers.
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I see. The marks look the same here as well and so I thought you just meant in general.
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Hey, I hope yesterday and today have gone smoother for you. Your post from a few days ago sounded exhausting, even for you. Woulda killed me.
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Nice pictures.
We have our own ‘Christmas Bird Count’ that uses a different methodology (walks along a regular route and counting of all individuals along the route) but aims towards comparable results. The Finnish data is much shorter, the counts started during the winter 1956/57.
What is perhaps better is that it has expanded to three counts per winter, one at the start of the winter, one at the time of the Christmas Bird Count and one at the late winter. This together with the counting of all individuals seen along the regular route allows calculations about wintertime survival as well as changes in relative abundances (individuals /10 km). Birds are associated to habitat classes, which means that analyses can also be done separately for each habitat class.
The latest addition to the methodology is mammals: also mammals seen along the route are counted nowadays.
I have two winter bird census routes that I have counted since 2006. It helps to keep up with the rapid changes in the bird communities and in the surroundings - changes in habitats as well as the number of winter feeding sites along the route are recorded every year.
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Know what is really weird. Greenbriers are monocots but vines with netted veining and woody stems. I have been seeing them for years, collecting and eating them by the thousands, and always presumed they were dicots. So it’s more closely related to grasses than forbs.
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That is really interesting! I’ll have to read more about that. Thank you!
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This also talks about it.
https://w3.biosci.utexas.edu/prc/Monocots/MonocotHTML/MonocotClass.html
Where I noticed it was looking through the list of Dicot and Monocot flora of Alabama. For a few years now, sometimes I may go weeks without looking at it and sometimes I may do it 2-3 hours a night, I’ve been categorizing the plants by trees, woody shrubs and woody vines. That way I have a list that is alphabetically lined out by family with that family than divided alphabetically by genus and then the genus by species. Right now the list is just by that and divided up as trees and shrubs together and then with identifiers like sub shrub, shrub, very small ( which is still 8-15 feet ) all the way up to very large which is 100+ feet. Once I get the whole list wrote out like that I want to go before each family and look up basic evolutionary history of them, then do the same for each genus and lay out their host species and season interest for each season and what they are most known for it if flowers, leaf shape or bark. I’ll write out their bloom time and color and growth rate along with their ecological importance for wildlife. Like what birds tend to nest
In them, eat their fruits, or peck it for insects and what insects do they host. Though it’s far off, I want to create a very extensive native plant book for landscaping purposes focused on the southern 2/3rds of Alabama. Then I’ll probably repeat it for NW Florida. Maybe it will even inspire people from each space in USA to eventually create their own.
I’ve looked for one and there is nothing that in-depth on the market that I’ve found that is categorized in a way beneficial to landscaping. It will have 100 trees or something and they will be scattered brought many states and so on or leave out really good landscaping info. Not doing it for money either. Once I am satisfied with how good it is I’ll type it all up on the computer and upload it to different places hoping others around here will use it and make their own notes in their own copies of it. I’ll do forbs ( herbaceous wildflowers and vines ) next and then the monocots. Gymnosperms will be easy enough. My goal is to help people from clients to landscapers have a far better way to design gardens with native plants which is far better for the environment and wildlife.
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Cute little kitty in the back yard. My wife said to not scare it, and I thought at first she said it out of regard for the skunk, then realized she just did not want it to spray!
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Beautiful.
What did the preacher skunk say to his friend as the big hunter accidentally burst into his territory?
“Let us spray!”
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Time for new glasses, Phil!
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Alas, new glasses with old eyes make little difference. Sort of like putting new wine in old wineskins…
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If skies are clear where you are, Mars goes behind the moon around 7:50 in our part of the world. Unfortunately it looks cloudy here.
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